The Sunset
by Comicbookfan
Summary: Jou and Seto have a conversation at the park, and Seto wonders when things changed. Maybe it started with Mokuba and Shizuka being in love. Maybe it was just time. Siblingshipping MokubaShizuka for Computerfreak101's pairing contest.


**Growing Up  
**

Summary: Jou and Seto have a conversation at the park, and Seto wonders when things changed. Maybe it started with Mokuba and Shizuka. Maybe it was just time. Siblingshipping (MokubaShizuka) for Computerfreak101's pairing contest.

Warning: Heterosexual and boyxboy pairings, language

Pairings: **MokubaShizuka**, SetoRyou, MaiJou

AN/ I played around with the ages some, so I made Mokuba only one year younger than Shizuka instead of my estimated two. Jou, Kaiba, and Ryou are twenty three in the present. Shizuka and Mokuba are eighteen and seventeen, respectively.

* * *

The park is quiet, peaceful.

It is a fairly cool day in the very middle of spring, and the park has beautiful trees and flowers.

Not many people know about it, so the place is nearly empty, except for a few people.

A tall, silent, imposing figure sits on a bench. A few yards away two figures chat amiably, one female, tall and curvaceous, and one male, slim and lithe and long-haired. Then, on another bench, two smaller figures, one female, one male sit. Their hands are clasped tightly.

The tall figure watches them.

The ground next to the bench where the imposing boy sits rustles, and he looks up to a boy with sunshine colored hair. His mouth twitches. "Hey Kaiba."

Kaiba nods jerkily, "Mutt." He acknowledges.

"I ain't a mutt. Last time I checked, I was Jou." The rivalry from a few years ago has almost faded, leaving only shadows, like that nickname.

Jou doesn't give Kaiba time to answer him as he nods towards the two figures on the other bench. "Look at them," he sighs out.

"What about them?"

"They always hold hands that way."

"They do."

The two figures' hair is tangling together, but they don't mind. Auburn and black mix well.

It's been years since those two met, since they became friends, since they fell in love.

"How's Ryou?"

"You see him all the time." Kaiba rolls his eyes.

"No, I mean, how's the _action?_" Jou wiggles his eyebrows suggestively.

No matter what, he's never going to be mature.

"Shut up."

"Heh. Now, just 'cause I know you wanna know, Mai's been good. I've been good."

"Like I didn't know. I see you all the time."

"I know."

Things have changed, over the years. They started, possibly, with Seto coming into the group.

Or maybe, the transition from life after Atem started when Shizuka and Mokuba first really met, and how things went from there...

* * *

_"Class, we have a new student, moved in from Tokyo! Jounouchi Shizuka. I hope you all make her feel welcomed."_

_Mokuba's eyes widened. He knew that girl! He waved his hand at her quietly, and she smiled and sat down in the empty seat next to him. He knows only a bit about little Jonouchi Shizuka, except that she should be about fifteen by now, fairly close to his fourteen. _

_At lunchtime, the older girl sits with him under a big weeping willow tree on the school property. She's very nice, and Mokuba adores her almost immediately._

_This is mainly because she sits with him, because he's unpopular and not many people would sit with him if they wanted a social life._

_After that, they become almost joined at the hip._

_

* * *

_

_The first time Jou sees Mokuba at the apartment Shizuka and he now share, after his father leaves him on his own and Shizuka insists she wants to live with him, he groans._

_"Don't tell me you two are _friends_ now!"_

_"Yeah. Why?"_

_"I dunno. You're related to that jerk," he's referring to Kaiba, "so you can't be all good." He's joking, and that's obvious by his wide grin and the way that he ruffles Mokuba's hair as he exits the room.

* * *

_

_Rumors go around the school often, about the new girl and the brother of Kaiba Seto._

_Some people say he's paying her to be his friend, loneliness finally going to his head. The two ignore these rumors, but that doesn't mean they don't sting a little._

_

* * *

_

_Sixteen year old Shizuka smiles and hugs Mokuba. "I'll see you later, okay?"_

_"Okay," he mumbles. There's something about her face and in her eyes that make him wonder if his feelings for Shizuka extend far, far beyond just friends._

_

* * *

_

_"You know, Seto," Mokuba says pensively._

_"Yes, Mokuba?" Seto is typing at his laptop, as always._

_"What would you say if I said I was in love with Shizuka?"_

_"I would say...wait what?! In love? With her?"_

_"What's wrong with Shizuka?"_

_"Shizuka's a very nice girl, Mokuba. There's just one problem."_

_"What?"_

_"Her brother."_

_"Don't act childish, Nii-sama. You don't hate Jou."_

_"Huh."_

_"But really, what would you say?"_

_Seto looks up blandly and shrugs. "I don't know. I don't know a thing about love. Mokuba, don't ask me about these things."_

_"I know you do."_

_"How?"_

_"I saw you kissing Ryou last week."_

_Seto's face colors lightly. "No, you didn't."_

_"I did. And the way you looked at him...Seto's in loooove!"_

_"Don't be childish, Mokuba."_

_"Heh."_

_"You aren't letting me work. Leave."_

_"Is it really that? Or are you just getting rid of me because your lo-ver is coming?"_

_"You really are a sixteen year old boy."

* * *

_

_Mokuba looks over at Shizuka, gnawing at his lip. It's almost graduation of senior year. They're going to the same college, but he knows he doesn't want her...finding a hot new boy. Or maybe even becoming attracted to her former admirers, Ryuuji and Honda, who are now in college along with the rest of the gang, sans Seto. Of course, he doesn't really think that's possible. Considering he's pretty sure they're gay. For each other._

_But, back to the real situation...what was it, again? Right, telling Shizuka about the fact that he was head over heels for her. "Shizu..." He starts talking._

_She puts a hand on his black hair, cream skin contrasting with the darkness. Then she comes closer to him, closing the distance between them._

_It isn't 'I love you', like he had been thinking obsessively about._

_It is, however, close enough.

* * *

_

_When Shizuka tells Jou that she's going out with Mokuba, he hugs her really, really hard and starts bawling. "My baby sister's growing up! And...and...and's in love with my worst enemy's little brother!"_

_Then he faints._

_Shizuka walks over his unconscious body to the phone, and dials her boyfriend's number. "How'd it go?" She looks over at her brother, then nods. "I think he took it pretty well!" _

_She then wonders why it came as such a shock to him, and he doesn't tell her that it's because he doesn't want her to grow up, or leave him, and would rather have been struck unconscious than live for one more second of that horrifying truth. His baby sister was basically gone._

_Mokuba was still his first choice for her, though.  
_

_

* * *

_The sun is setting.

The park is nearly silent.

"It's probably time to go home." Kaiba says stiffly.

The park is bathed with shades of pink and purple and blue.

He looks over at Shizuka and Mokuba, in their first year of college and probably on their way to marriage. He looks at Mai, with the engagement wring on her finger, and Ryou, wearing the cashmere sweater Seto bought for him.

He notices how mellow Jou and he are towards each other, and then he wonders how they all grew up so fast.

"Yup," Jou grins, having setting aside he and his kind of arch-rival's differences for a while. "And so we sail on!" He makes a stupid _onward!_ motion with a klutzy grin on his face.

"Goodbye, Mutt."

Jou's eyes narrow. "Quit calling me that!"

"Never."

It's one bit of old days they're never letting go.


End file.
